


Shark bait

by shyfoxes (novashyperion)



Category: Dishonored (Video Games)
Genre: Merpeople, Other, Short Fics, Sirens, The Outsider shows up, to be unhelpful
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-19
Updated: 2019-08-19
Packaged: 2020-09-07 04:43:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 571
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20303665
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/novashyperion/pseuds/shyfoxes
Summary: Corvo flops over onto his back and takes giant heaping breathes. Fuck the ocean, he thinks.





	Shark bait

The lenses in the mask help little. But undeniable in the murky, filthy water is a rune. Corvo can see the unnatural way it shines, bright and ominous even through the brown current. Sometimes, but Corvo won’t say, he thinks he might hear laughter. It’s too muted a sound to know for true. It’s a wonder he can hear at all the way the water clings to him like it will never let go.

Narrowly, he passes by a hagfish when a dead body breaches the water and sinks. Still, something seems to caress him through the water. A feather-light touch unmistakable from the water, but nothing, not even fish are circling him. He nears the charm. A few feet away and he can see how meticulously placed it looks. It’s glowing, and so are the gemstones encircling it. They beat in time, like a heartbeat, a pulse of a vein in the crag of a creature formed in the rock. Just like its counterparts on land, the shrine has great jutting pieces; bones and sharpened spears, maybe rocks. 

Something brushes Corvo again. Harder this time. There aren’t sharks this far out in Dunwall, not like Serkonos. Big hulking masses, teeth the size of men’s arms. Deadly and curious in a rough-skinned package. He’s been a shark’s play thing before, swimming in the sea with his sister and family. Been bumped by a curious one, who had circled and watched and fled when it had been satisfied. It laughs, maybe, whatever it is. And because this isn’t his realm, Corvo might even believe the laugh echoes like a muted choir.

Corvo creeps closer, just shy of his lungs burning. Cradled in the jaw of some great fish, lies the rune. It shines a blinding purple, smoking and glittering as if the water must work around it instead. A finger works its way up the back of Corvo’s neck, swirling current down the length of his waist and legs, and away into the darkened waters. 

It’s when Corvo makes to swim back that a large current surrounds him. They pulse in a hazy swirl, carrying him along in their stream. They laugh again, bumping at him, circling him, but never blocking his view of the surface. He can’t see, he can’t see, and all over there are touches and laughter, and his lungs burn for air. The surface is just there, and then there are hands holding him like great netting. Like a kiss, almost tender, something touches the mark on Corvo’s hand. He is alone.

When he claws through the surface, gasping on the shore, there are black boots hovering just barely above the soaked sand. Above him, the frustratingly familiar face of The Outsider looks back. His expression gives little away, but Corvo can almost feel his amusement. Something in the slight narrowing of his eyes, and the way his lips don’t fully stay flat-lined. 

“I see you’ve met Dunwall’s oldest, Corvo. Your kind has known them as Sirens, but I imagine they beg to differ. They’ve been here longer than Dunwall has been alive, and they’ll be here when it’s long gone, too. How fascinating that they should let you go. Maybe you are as interesting as you seem.” He disappears like that, as usual, giving almost nothing of value as he does. 

Corvo flops over onto his back and takes giant heaping breathes._ Fuck the ocean_, he thinks. 

**Author's Note:**

> hi i'm just trying to write a little bit every (other) day. Corvo's backstory is totally wrong isn't it, WELP. There should be mermaids in Dishonored dammit. But I imagine if there were, they'd be kind of fond of The Outsider, being all Whale-God-ish and what not. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ 
> 
> https://shyfoxes.tumblr.com/post/187100794803/corvo-flops-over-onto-his-back-and-takes-giant


End file.
